The world economy no longer faces one crisis at a time. It faces overlapping stress.
Debt pressure in developing countries. Inflation driven by war and energy prices. Supply-chain disruptions. Trade fragmentation. Climate-finance gaps. Food and fertiliser insecurity. Currency volatility. Higher defence spending. Technological disruption. Protectionism. Unequal recovery after the pandemic. Growing distrust between major powers. And frustration among poorer countries that often feel global economic rules are written elsewhere but enforced upon them.
No single institution can manage all of these pressures alone.
The United Nations has universal legitimacy, but political divisions limit its ability to manage day-to-day economic coordination. The International Monetary Fund has financial expertise and lending capacity, but remains associated in many developing countries with creditor power and difficult conditionality. The World Bank has enormous development experience, yet its resources remain insufficient for the scale of climate, infrastructure and social-investment needs. The World Trade Organization provides the formal architecture of global trade, but its negotiating difficulties and dispute-settlement crisis demonstrate how much the old trade consensus has weakened.
Into this crowded institutional landscape, the G20 has emerged as the most important practical forum for coordinating responses to global economic stress.
It is not a world government. It has no treaty-based authority, permanent secretariat or power to force governments to implement its declarations. Yet it possesses something few other institutions can replicate: it brings the world’s most consequential advanced and emerging economies into the same political forum.
The G20 consists of 19 countries together with the European Union and African Union. Its members account for roughly 85% of global GDP, more than three-quarters of international trade and about two-thirds of the world’s population.
Its strength lies in that combination of economic weight and political diversity.
Unlike the G7, it is not primarily a grouping of wealthy Western-aligned economies. Unlike the UN General Assembly, it is not universal to the point that rapid economic coordination becomes nearly impossible.
The G20 sits between the two.
It is large enough to represent most of the economic power that shapes the world, yet small enough to negotiate.
That makes it the crisis table of an increasingly stressed global economy.
The G20 Was Born From Crisis
The G20’s origins explain why crisis management remains central to its role.
It was established in 1999 following the Asian financial crisis as a forum for finance ministers and central-bank governors. The crisis had shown that instability in emerging economies could spread rapidly through an interconnected financial system.
The global financial crisis of 2008 transformed the institution.
As banking systems failed, credit markets froze and recession threatened to spread across continents, the G20 was elevated to the leaders’ level. It subsequently became recognised as the premier forum for international economic cooperation.
This change reflected a broader shift in global economic power.
By 2008, the United States, Europe and Japan could no longer manage systemic economic crises without China, India, Brazil, South Africa, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, Mexico and other major emerging economies.
The world had become too economically interconnected and too politically multipolar for the old Western-led clubs to manage alone.
The G20 exists because global economic power is distributed across several centres.
Why the G20 Became More Important Than the G7
The G7 remains influential. Its members possess advanced technology, deep capital markets, reserve currencies, military power and strong institutional capacity.
But the G7 cannot manage the contemporary global economy on its own.
Energy Requires Producers and Consumers
A major energy shock cannot be discussed meaningfully without countries such as Saudi Arabia and other large producers alongside major consumers.
Debt Requires New Creditors
Many developing countries now owe significant amounts to creditors outside the traditional Paris Club system. China’s role in development lending means serious debt restructuring increasingly requires Beijing at the table.
Climate Requires Emerging Economies
A large share of future energy demand, infrastructure construction and emissions growth will occur in developing economies. Climate policy cannot be designed exclusively by wealthy states.
Trade Requires the New Economic Centres
China, India, Brazil, Indonesia and other large economies are central to global manufacturing, commodities, services and consumer markets.
The G7 can coordinate advanced economies.
The G20 can attempt coordination across competing economic systems.
That diversity makes agreement more difficult. But it also makes agreement more significant.
A G7 declaration primarily represents advanced economies. A G20 declaration, when consensus is achieved, reflects convergence across a much broader distribution of global power.
The Global Economy Is Again Under Stress
The G20’s relevance becomes clearest when global economic risks intensify.
The IMF’s April 2026 World Economic Outlook, as cited in the original draft, warned of renewed pressure from conflict in the Middle East, higher commodity prices, stronger inflation expectations and tighter financial conditions. It projected global growth of around 3.1% in 2026 and 3.2% in 2027 while warning that risks remained tilted to the downside.
Emerging and developing economies, particularly commodity importers already carrying economic vulnerabilities, were expected to face concentrated pressure.
These are precisely the kinds of conditions the G20 was created to address.
Inflation is no longer only domestic.
Energy prices cross borders.
Food prices cross borders.
Shipping disruptions affect global supply chains.
Capital moves almost instantly between markets.
A debt crisis in one region can affect banks and investors elsewhere.
War in one region can raise household costs thousands of kilometres away.
National governments remain responsible for domestic policy, but many of the forces shaping those policies are international.
That creates a need for coordination among the economies capable of influencing global outcomes.
The G20 Does Not Command — It Coordinates
The G20’s influence does not come from legal authority.
It comes from the economic importance of its members.
When the United States changes monetary-policy expectations, global capital markets respond.
When China’s economy slows or accelerates, commodity exporters and manufacturers around the world feel the effects.
When India’s growth changes, patterns of energy consumption, technology demand, investment and trade change with it.
When the European Union introduces climate-related trade rules, exporters across multiple regions must adjust.
When Saudi Arabia and other major producers respond to oil-market conditions, inflation expectations can change globally.
When Brazil, South Africa and Indonesia push development concerns, issues affecting the Global South enter discussions among the world’s largest economic powers.
The G20 brings these actors into one political process.
Its influence works through agenda-setting, peer pressure, signalling, coordination and follow-up through international institutions.
It cannot create binding global law.
But it can create direction.
In a fragmented world, even minimum coordination has value.
The 2008 Financial Crisis Made the G20 Indispensable
The global financial crisis remains the clearest example of the G20 operating as an emergency economic coordination mechanism.
As the crisis spread from the American financial system into the global economy, governments faced the possibility of a severe and prolonged depression.
G20 leaders coordinated fiscal stimulus, financial-sector reform and international institutional responses while attempting to prevent a destructive turn toward protectionism.
The forum also supported reforms to financial supervision and helped expand the Financial Stability Forum into the Financial Stability Board.
India’s G20 material cited in the draft credits the forum with helping mobilise support for expanding IMF resources and strengthening the lending role of multilateral development banks.
The lesson was significant.
A systemic economic crisis could not be managed by central banks, the IMF, World Bank or G7 operating separately.
Leader-level political coordination was necessary.
The G20 provided it.
COVID-19 Expanded the G20’s Crisis Role
The COVID-19 pandemic tested the G20 under very different circumstances.
The pandemic was simultaneously a health crisis, employment crisis, fiscal crisis, debt crisis, supply-chain crisis and trade crisis.
Governments needed to finance emergency spending, support households and businesses, stabilise markets and keep essential goods moving across borders.
Debt pressure became particularly serious for poorer countries.
The G20 responded through initiatives including the Debt Service Suspension Initiative and the Common Framework for Debt Treatments.
The Common Framework was established in 2020 under the Saudi G20 presidency and endorsed by the Paris Club as a mechanism for coordinating debt treatment for eligible countries.
It has not performed as quickly or effectively as many developing countries hoped.
But its existence illustrates a deeper structural change.
Modern sovereign debt problems involve traditional bilateral creditors, China, private bondholders, multilateral institutions and debtor governments.
No older creditor club can coordinate all of them alone.
Debt restructuring increasingly requires a G20-type political framework.
Debt Is Now One of the G20’s Hardest Tests
Debt may be the clearest test of whether the G20 can move from crisis discussion to crisis resolution.
Many developing economies emerged from the pandemic with weaker public finances. They then faced higher global interest rates, expensive energy, food inflation and growing climate-investment requirements.
The result is a severe fiscal squeeze.
Governments need to spend more on infrastructure, healthcare, education, food security and climate adaptation while simultaneously devoting larger shares of revenue to debt service.
The World Bank’s International Debt Report 2025, as cited in the original article, found that developing economies paid $741 billion more in principal and interest on external debt than they received in new financing between 2022 and 2024.
That represented the largest such gap in at least half a century.
The development consequences are serious.
When debt service consumes government revenue, investment in public services declines.
When restructuring takes years, uncertainty discourages investment.
When creditors disagree, debtor countries remain trapped.
What the G20 Must Change on Debt
The Common Framework needs substantial improvement.
Faster Restructuring
Debt negotiations cannot take years while economies deteriorate.
Better Creditor Coordination
Traditional creditors, China and other bilateral lenders need clearer processes for reaching comparable treatment.
Stronger Private-Creditor Participation
Private bondholders cannot remain outside effective restructuring arrangements indefinitely.
Greater Transparency
Debtor countries and creditors need clearer information about liabilities and restructuring assumptions.
Links to Development Investment
Debt relief should create genuine fiscal space for development rather than simply postpone repayment pressure.
The G20 cannot claim to manage global economic stress if large parts of the developing world remain trapped in recurring debt crises.
The Global South Has Changed the G20 Agenda
The G20 has also become more important because developing countries have become more assertive within it.
The consecutive presidencies of Indonesia in 2022, India in 2023, Brazil in 2024 and South Africa in 2025 created an unusually strong sequence of emerging-market leadership.
These presidencies broadened the G20 agenda beyond traditional macroeconomic coordination.
Development finance, debt, food security, digital public infrastructure, climate justice, inequality, hunger and global-governance reform moved closer to the centre of discussions.
Indonesia
Indonesia’s presidency strengthened attention to post-pandemic recovery and the challenges facing developing economies.
India
India pushed digital public infrastructure, Global South concerns, development, climate finance and institutional representation.
Brazil
Brazil’s 2024 presidency focused heavily on social inclusion, hunger, poverty, sustainable development, climate action and reform of global governance institutions.
South Africa
South Africa’s 2025 presidency was historically significant because it marked the first G20 presidency led from the African continent.
This sequence changed the political character of the G20.
The forum is no longer only about stabilising banks and financial markets.
It increasingly asks whether the international economic system is producing development fairly.
African Union Membership Changed the G20
The African Union’s admission as a permanent G20 member during India’s 2023 presidency was one of the most consequential institutional changes in the forum’s history.
Africa is central to future population growth, climate vulnerability, critical minerals, infrastructure demand, food systems, migration and development finance.
Yet the continent was historically underrepresented in many of the institutions shaping international economic policy.
AU membership partially corrects that imbalance.
It also improves the G20’s legitimacy.
A forum attempting to manage global economic stress cannot treat Africa merely as a subject of discussion.
African countries need representation in the institution where major decisions concerning debt, infrastructure, climate finance and development are politically coordinated.
Why the G20 Is Suited to a World of Polycrisis
The modern global economy is defined by interconnected risks.
Debt connects to climate because governments need financing for adaptation and clean energy.
Climate affects agriculture.
Agricultural disruption affects food prices.
Food prices affect inflation.
Inflation influences interest rates.
Interest rates affect debt service.
Debt stress can produce social instability.
Instability can contribute to migration.
Migration affects labour markets and politics.
Trade fragmentation connects directly to geopolitical rivalry.
Security rivalry affects technology controls, industrial policy and defence spending.
This is the logic of polycrisis.
No specialised institution has a mandate broad enough to manage all of these relationships.
The G20 does.
The Finance Track
The Finance Track covers issues such as macroeconomic coordination, international taxation, debt, financial regulation and multilateral finance.
The Sherpa Track
The Sherpa Track covers development, health, energy, climate, trade, agriculture, digital economy, employment and other cross-cutting issues.
Rotating Presidencies
The rotating presidency allows different countries to bring new priorities into the agenda.
The system is imperfect, but flexible.
That flexibility is one reason the G20 has become increasingly important for managing interconnected economic stress.
Climate Finance Has Become a Core G20 Issue
Climate change is turning economic coordination into survival politics for many countries.
Developing economies need enormous amounts of investment for renewable energy, resilient infrastructure, adaptation, agriculture, disaster protection and industrial transition.
Yet they often face the highest borrowing costs and weakest access to affordable capital.
Advanced economies frequently argue that private finance must do more.
Developing economies respond that commercial finance is often too expensive, particularly for adaptation projects that do not generate straightforward financial returns.
The G20 includes many of the countries capable of changing this equation.
Its members include the world’s largest emitters, leading shareholders of development banks, major fossil-fuel producers, major emerging economies and some of the countries most exposed to climate risks.
Climate finance cannot move at sufficient scale without political convergence among them.
Climate Politics Also Reveals the G20’s Divisions
Agreement remains difficult because member interests vary greatly.
Some G20 economies depend heavily on fossil-fuel exports.
Others remain dependent on coal.
Some prioritise rapid decarbonisation.
Others emphasise energy security and industrial development.
Climate-vulnerable countries demand greater recognition of historical responsibility.
Advanced economies increasingly emphasise current and future emissions.
The G20 cannot eliminate these conflicts.
But it can connect climate targets with finance, technology, development and industrial policy.
That coordination is essential.
A global climate agenda that does not involve the G20’s major economies will remain structurally weak.
Reforming the World Bank and IMF Requires G20 Politics
Calls for reform of the World Bank, IMF and other multilateral development banks have become increasingly prominent.
The fundamental problem is scale.
Developing countries need vast amounts of capital for infrastructure, climate adaptation, clean energy, healthcare, digital systems and resilience.
Many cannot borrow affordably from commercial markets.
This has led to demands for:
Larger Lending Capacity
Multilateral banks need greater ability to mobilise capital.
More Concessional Finance
Poorer countries require loans with lower interest rates and longer repayment periods.
Better Climate Finance
Adaptation and resilience need much greater investment.
Local-Currency Lending
Foreign-currency debt can expose countries to exchange-rate shocks.
Faster Project Delivery
Long approval processes can undermine the value of financing.
Stronger Developing-Country Representation
Institutional governance still reflects older distributions of economic power.
The G20 matters because its members are among the principal shareholders of these institutions.
The UN can call for reform.
The development banks can design reforms.
But the major G20 economies possess the political and financial power required to implement them.
Trade Fragmentation Requires Political Coordination
The WTO remains the formal institution governing international trade.
But the political management of trade stress increasingly occurs elsewhere.
Tariffs, industrial subsidies, export controls, national-security restrictions and climate-related trade measures are reshaping global commerce.
Trade disputes now involve semiconductors, batteries, electric vehicles, rare earths, artificial intelligence, digital platforms and strategic technologies.
These issues sit at the intersection of economics and national security.
The G20 cannot replace the WTO.
But it can provide political channels through which major economies discuss fragmentation before disputes become uncontrolled trade conflict.
The G20 Needs a New Trade Balance
The old assumption that liberalisation should always proceed regardless of security considerations has weakened.
Governments increasingly prioritise resilience.
The challenge is preventing resilience from becoming unrestricted protectionism.
The G20 can support a middle path.
Keep Trade Open Where Possible
Unnecessary restrictions raise costs and weaken growth.
Permit Legitimate Resilience
Governments need some capacity to protect critical supply chains.
Increase Subsidy Transparency
Industrial policy should not become disguised economic warfare.
Limit Export-Control Abuse
Security restrictions should remain proportionate to genuine risks.
Preserve Policy Space for Developing Countries
Emerging economies still need room to industrialise.
The old free-trade consensus may be fading.
The alternative should not be trade chaos.
Inflation and Interest Rates Have Global Spillovers
Central banks set monetary policy according to domestic conditions, but the consequences can travel internationally.
When advanced economies raise interest rates, capital may flow away from emerging markets.
Currencies can weaken.
Foreign-currency debt becomes more expensive.
Government borrowing costs rise.
At the same time, energy or food shocks originating elsewhere can push domestic inflation higher.
This makes communication important even when policy cannot be formally coordinated.
Finance ministers and central-bank governors can use the G20 to discuss spillovers, financial-safety nets and risks to vulnerable economies.
The objective is not identical monetary policy.
It is avoiding unnecessary policy conflict.
Food and Energy Security Are Now Macroeconomic Issues
Food and energy were once frequently treated as sectoral concerns.
Today they are central economic-security issues.
Energy shocks can increase inflation, weaken currencies and expand government subsidy bills.
Food-price shocks can increase hunger, fiscal pressure and political instability.
Fertiliser shortages can affect future harvests.
Export restrictions can create panic and worsen scarcity.
The G20 includes many of the largest food producers, energy exporters, commodity importers and consumer markets.
That makes it particularly useful for coordination.
The Agricultural Market Information System, created with G20 support following the 2011 Cannes Summit, illustrates how improved transparency can reduce uncertainty in agricultural markets.
Similar coordination is increasingly important as war and climate change make food and energy shocks more frequent.
The G20’s Greatest Weakness Is Implementation
The main criticism of the G20 is straightforward.
It cannot enforce what it agrees.
Declarations are politically important but not legally binding.
A government may endorse a summit communiqué and later follow a different domestic policy.
A presidency may launch ambitious initiatives that receive less attention under the next presidency.
Geopolitical disagreements can produce vague language.
Commitments can remain unfunded.
That is why critics sometimes dismiss the G20 as a talk shop.
The criticism is not entirely wrong.
But it overlooks the institution’s real function.
The G20 is not designed to operate like a court or legislature.
It is a steering forum.
Its purpose is to create enough political coordination among major economies for specialised institutions and national governments to act.
Geopolitics Could Still Break the G20
The G20’s future effectiveness is threatened by geopolitical rivalry.
US-China competition divides the two largest economies.
Russia’s war in Ukraine created profound political tensions among members.
Conflict in the Middle East affects both diplomatic relations and energy markets.
Technology controls and trade disputes are expanding.
Climate politics divides exporters, industrial powers and vulnerable economies.
These disagreements make consensus increasingly difficult.
But the G20’s value lies precisely in containing countries that disagree.
If the forum can function only when major powers are politically aligned, it will lose much of its purpose.
Economic cooperation needs to continue even when security disputes remain unresolved.
That does not mean ignoring war or fundamental political disagreements.
It means preventing every geopolitical conflict from paralysing cooperation on debt, inflation, food security, development finance and financial stability.
Why the G20 Matters to India
For India, the G20 is one of the most strategically useful multilateral forums.
It allows New Delhi to operate simultaneously as a major economy and as a developing-country voice.
India can engage the United States, Europe, Russia, China, the Gulf, Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia within the same framework.
That aligns closely with India’s preference for strategic autonomy.
India’s 2023 presidency demonstrated how the forum can be used for agenda-setting.
Digital public infrastructure, Global South priorities, development, climate finance and African representation all received greater visibility.
India’s economic interests also overlap with the G20’s agenda.
The country benefits from stable energy markets, functioning trade systems, resilient global supply chains, debt stability in developing markets and stronger climate-finance mechanisms.
The G20 Gives India a Distinctive Diplomatic Position
India occupies an unusual position in global economic politics.
It is one of the world’s largest economies, yet it still faces many development challenges associated with the Global South.
This allows India to understand both sides of several debates.
It wants strong global markets but also development policy space.
It needs climate action but also affordable energy.
It seeks investment while arguing for reform of international financial institutions.
It works with Western economies while remaining active in groupings such as BRICS.
The G20 allows India to operate across these divides without having to choose a single geopolitical bloc.
That makes the forum particularly compatible with India’s broader diplomatic strategy.
Why the G20 Matters to the Global South
For developing countries, the G20 is imperfect but useful.
It provides a route for concerns involving debt, climate finance, food security, digital infrastructure, health, development finance and governance reform to reach the countries that control significant amounts of capital and institutional voting power.
The sequence of Indonesian, Indian, Brazilian and South African presidencies has increased that relevance.
It demonstrated that the G20 agenda can be shaped by developing-country priorities rather than being defined entirely by advanced economies.
The inclusion of the African Union strengthens that potential further.
But representation must eventually produce outcomes.
Global South governments will judge the G20 by whether debt restructuring becomes faster, climate finance becomes cheaper and development financing becomes more accessible.
Eight Priorities for a Stronger G20
The G20 now needs to move from crisis discussion toward crisis delivery.
1. Fix Sovereign Debt Restructuring
The Common Framework needs faster timelines, better creditor coordination and stronger participation by private lenders.
2. Accelerate Multilateral Development Bank Reform
Development finance needs to become larger, cheaper, faster and better aligned with infrastructure and climate needs.
3. Strengthen Food and Fertiliser Security
Better transparency, emergency financing and supply-chain coordination can reduce panic during global shocks.
4. Manage Trade Fragmentation
Major economies need political discipline around tariffs, subsidies, export controls and industrial-policy competition.
5. Make Climate Finance Credible
Developing countries cannot be expected to accelerate transition without affordable capital and technology.
6. Improve Implementation
G20 commitments should increasingly include measurable targets and follow-up mechanisms.
7. Deepen Representation
African Union membership should be accompanied by stronger attention to low-income countries, small island states and other vulnerable economies.
8. Protect Economic Cooperation From Geopolitical Breakdown
Security disagreements should not automatically destroy cooperation on global economic stability.
The G20’s long-term relevance will depend less on the length of its declarations than on measurable outcomes.
Three Possible Futures for the G20
The G20 now faces several possible trajectories.
The Best Scenario: The G20 Becomes a Delivery Forum
Debt restructuring becomes faster. Development banks expand lending. Climate finance improves. Food-security coordination strengthens. Trade disputes remain manageable.
The G20 develops stronger mechanisms for tracking implementation.
In this scenario, the institution becomes the practical steering forum of a multipolar global economy.
The Middle Scenario: The G20 Remains a Diplomatic Safety Valve
Major economies continue meeting and producing summit declarations, but structural reforms remain slow.
The forum prevents complete breakdown in communication but achieves limited progress on debt, trade or climate finance.
It remains useful, but below its potential.
The Worst Scenario: Geopolitics Paralyses the Forum
US-China rivalry, major wars and economic nationalism make meaningful consensus almost impossible.
Countries increasingly rely on competing blocs.
The G20 continues formally but loses its ability to coordinate global responses.
That outcome would leave a serious gap in global economic governance.
The G20 Reflects a Multipolar Global Economy
The rise of the G20 mirrors the wider transformation of economic power.
The post-war economy was dominated heavily by the United States and its allies.
That system has not disappeared, but it has changed substantially.
China has become a central economic power.
India is rising.
Brazil, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and Türkiye carry greater weight.
Africa now participates institutionally through the African Union.
Supply chains are more geographically distributed.
Capital flows are more complex.
Climate risks affect every region.
Development financing needs are enormous.
No single bloc can govern this economy.
The G20 is therefore not important because it has solved multipolarity.
It is important because it reflects it.
Its internal disagreements are partly evidence of its relevance.
The tensions inside the G20 are the tensions of the global economy itself.
Why This Matters to Ordinary People
Global economic coordination can appear distant from everyday life.
It is not.
When energy markets become unstable, fuel and transport costs can rise.
When food markets are disrupted, grocery bills increase.
When advanced economies raise interest rates, currencies and borrowing costs in developing countries can come under pressure.
When debt service rises, governments may have less money for healthcare, education and infrastructure.
When trade conflict increases, businesses and jobs can suffer.
When climate finance remains insufficient, vulnerable communities face larger disaster and adaptation costs.
The G20 matters because decisions made by its members eventually reach households through prices, employment, taxes, investment and public services.
Global economic stress becomes local economic stress.
The World Needs a Stronger G20
The G20 has emerged as the principal forum for managing global economic stress because modern crises are too interconnected for specialised institutions to manage independently and too urgent for purely symbolic diplomacy.
It brings together economies that produce, consume, borrow, lend, trade, invest, emit and regulate at global scale.
It includes advanced and emerging economies.
It now includes the African Union.
It can connect debt with development, climate with finance, trade with security, food with inflation and technology with growth.
But the rise of the G20 also reflects a deeper problem.
The old global economic consensus has weakened.
Governments no longer assume that unrestricted globalisation will automatically produce shared prosperity.
Developing countries increasingly reject the idea that global institutions can be governed permanently according to older distributions of power.
Advanced economies are using industrial policy and security restrictions more aggressively.
Climate change is forcing new debates over responsibility, technology and finance.
Debt is constraining development.
Trade is fragmenting.
The G20 is the forum where these competing visions increasingly confront one another.
Its success is not guaranteed.
It may become trapped in geopolitical conflict.
It may produce declarations without implementation.
It may fail to reform debt, climate finance and development institutions quickly enough.
But there is no obvious alternative capable of performing the same function.
The UN is universal but too politically broad for rapid economic coordination.
The G7 is influential but too narrow.
The IMF and World Bank have specialised institutional mandates.
The WTO remains constrained by deep political disagreements.
Regional forums cannot manage global spillovers alone.
That leaves the G20 as the most realistic political table for coordinating responses to global economic crises.
The world economy is under stress. Global institutions are under pressure. Developing countries are demanding greater voice. Advanced economies are protecting strategic industries. Emerging powers are demanding greater influence. Climate change is increasing financing needs. Debt is squeezing public budgets. Trade is becoming more fragmented.
In such a world, the G20 is not merely another summit.
It is the closest thing the global economy currently has to an emergency coordination room.
